I sat down a few weeks ago and wrote this long story.. I was nearly finished with it and facebook made it disappear. I was so mad it took me a while before I could think about it again but....it's time.
As I have mentioned several times I am an only child.
My heroes have always been women who've raised big families. One of my favorite women of all was my mother-in-law, Maggie Brown. I remember meeting her once before I fell in love with her youngest child. I didn't believe he had 10 siblings, she assured me he did. I guess you could kind of say I loved her before I knew I loved him. Her birthday was yesterday. She's been in Heaven going on five years now. I thank her for having that last baby, for raising him the way she did and for welcoming me into her family like I was one of her own.
It was May 31, 1981. I was soon to be a senior at the University of Montevallo and was working for the summer at Ridgecrest Baptist Conference Center in North Carolina. I was not interested in meeting anyone "new" but my girlfriends back at school kept telling me I had to meet Michael Brown....he went to a jr college in south Alabama and apparently every girl I knew had met him. All I kept hearing was he was funny and had pretty eyes. He was going to be transferring to UM and I needed to be a good ambassador and make him feel welcome. I had no more interest in "finding" him at Ridgecrest than finding a new species of poisonous plant, but on that first day, I saw this young man standing on the staff center steps...he was surrounded by girls....they were all laughing. I thought to myself, "Oh brother, that must be him, he must think he's just hilarious, I'm not buying in". I didn't actually meet him that day, I don't think but I count it as meeting because I knew who he was even without anyone telling me. Later, my roommate Kay actually introduced us and I have to admit, he was rather charming but I still had no intentions of "liking him".
One day I had been to a clowning workshop...I was really interested in that form of ministry, had been since Godspell. I was in my whiteface makeup and suspenders and who should I run into but Michael. He was sweeping the porch. He stopped me and asked me who I was. Of course a good mime NEVER talks with whiteface on so I made him guess. He figured it out in a little while then asked with all the exuberance of Victor Garber himself (Jesus from Godspell) if I could do that to HIS FACE! That was the first clue I had that there might just be some substance to this pretty boy. I nodded yes and was on my way. We had several encounters that summer, all crazy and fun, one night the staff was going on a hayride. I had decided not to go but was walking along the road when the truck came by. I was literally pulled up onto the hay by laughing friends only to find there was not one square inch to sit on. I felt hands pull me down into a lap. Then a sweet voice made a comment in my ear I won't repeat in this story but I will never forget. I sat there stunned that a "preacher boy" would be so bold and thankful that the dark hid my red face.
Later, we talked about what we wanted to do in life. I made it pretty clear that one of my biggest priorities was a big family. He never discouraged me at all. I even told him I might even want a children's home....he thought that was a great dream. I have to say I was impressed. He was all the things my girlfriends said and more.
So to make a long story one you'll finish reading, we talked and talked and talked. He came to Montevallo and we really talked. By Thanksgiving he was helping me through a really tough time I was having personally, at Christmas he came to my house, by January I knew I probably wouldn't want to live without him and in February he proposed.....six times. I just couldn't commit! I kept telling him that I really wanted to trust him but I had been burned. He waited and then asked again. He says he finally just talked me into it. I suppose that could be true and I wonder what on earth my problem was in the first place!
We just celebrated 27 years of marriage and today as we drove home from the same mountains where I first saw him entertaining those girls I was thankful that God knew what would happen when this only kid and the youngest of eleven met.
He still makes me laugh all the time.
Walking the Tight Rope in Clown Shoes with Angie B...
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
What I Think Happened To Jon and Kate
I watched in horror the other night as Kate dabbed her eyes, she sat on the sofa alone. She shared that the statistics for marriages surviving "multiples" were grim but she had never thought she and Jon would fall prey.
Nobody asked my opinion. I doubt many will care what I think but if I could talk to Kate I'd tell her a few things she might need to know. This has less to do with "multiples" and more to do with attitudes of the adults involved than she realizes.
I have to admit I haven't watched the show all that much. I enjoy the shenanigans of all those toddlers and preschoolers only because it makes me thankful that I had all mine one at a time. I have always thought the idea of multiple births sounded interesting but I never had a moments trouble with fertility so it was never a serious thought.
I have watched enough to see an edge come to Kate that seemed uncomfortable to viewers. I have heard people saying that she is "just mean". I don't think she wants to be mean. She is an admitted control freak, she's germ phobic and has a touch of OCD, well maybe more than a touch.
The problem, I believe is she is a woman who is living in an uncontrollable situation.
I believe she started losing it when she started trying to control everything her husband did. She started treating him like he was one of her children. HE ACTS LIKE A CHILD! But, instead of building him up to be the man of honor in their home she started telling the kids not to listen to Daddy. She just set herself up to have it all explode in her face. I don't believe any man really wants to be married to someone who mothers him.
They lost themselves.... I can't imagine how hard it would be to have cameras in my house all the time. I would not want the circus to be a reality show. I would be tagged "mean" immediately
Being the mother of seven children....five of them living at home, I understand the need for some sort of order! Nobody else in this family of artist/dreamers seems to care if the floor is spotless or they are sticking to it, if they have clean clothes or they go bare, if dinner is homecooked or cold and fast. I suppose I should be SO GRATEFUL! and to a degree, I am. But with this "easygoingness" comes a price. I am the sole housekeeper. It gets really frustrating when I am trying to get something accomplished that anyone could help me with really but I am left to do it myself. I want to scream (and sometimes I do). I want to control my husband!!! Yell at him, maybe throw in a degrading stab. Then, I come to my senses! I wouldn't trade my husband for a clean house! That is where Kate has stumbled. She has not come to her senses and apparently nobody around her has told her she needs to snap out of it. All of us get cranky and unpleasant when we are stressed and tired. Why on earth would you let a camera capture this and then show it to the world? I don't even like the fact that I think such things much less would share them with millions of people. I understand she's been making personal appearances and doing inspirational speaking. I don't understand why any young woman would want to listen to her after she has told a babysitter that the kids' daddy is stupid! If this kind of behavior is the trend of young Christian wives we are in for some troubling times.
I don't ever excuse infidelity. Jon has been accused of having an affair (when has he had time?). I think maybe he admitted it I don't know but Kate has treated him like a child and he's gone out and acted like an adolescent...who is surprised? I'm not saying this is Kate's fault! But do you think Jon didn't think he would get caught? I believe he wanted to get caught...maybe Kate would see that he is a man that someone else would be interested in. She certainly didn't seem to see him as anyone desirable.
So back to the point...
Jon and Kate can make this work. They both need to seek some good GODLY advice from someone who has survived a large family.
They need to start over as a couple. I know that you can't just be parents and survive as lovers.
Their kids deserve to see a loving relationship between their parents and not just teamwork or cooperation. Kids want their parents to love each other!
Kate needs to get over her obsession with perfection.
Jon needs to grow up.
Other than that, they need to remember that everything they've been given is a gift from God. They should respect that he allowed all those babies to live for a reason. They grow up so fast and then you are left standing in the driveway wondering where the years went. In their case they will most likely all leave at the same time!!!!!
I pray they get it together. How will there be a show if there is no Jon and Kate. I could not get excited about a season of divorce court. The whole attraction was the family! Maybe it's time to pull the plug on the camera. I'd gladly give up the entertainment to see them survive.
Nobody asked my opinion. I doubt many will care what I think but if I could talk to Kate I'd tell her a few things she might need to know. This has less to do with "multiples" and more to do with attitudes of the adults involved than she realizes.
I have to admit I haven't watched the show all that much. I enjoy the shenanigans of all those toddlers and preschoolers only because it makes me thankful that I had all mine one at a time. I have always thought the idea of multiple births sounded interesting but I never had a moments trouble with fertility so it was never a serious thought.
I have watched enough to see an edge come to Kate that seemed uncomfortable to viewers. I have heard people saying that she is "just mean". I don't think she wants to be mean. She is an admitted control freak, she's germ phobic and has a touch of OCD, well maybe more than a touch.
The problem, I believe is she is a woman who is living in an uncontrollable situation.
I believe she started losing it when she started trying to control everything her husband did. She started treating him like he was one of her children. HE ACTS LIKE A CHILD! But, instead of building him up to be the man of honor in their home she started telling the kids not to listen to Daddy. She just set herself up to have it all explode in her face. I don't believe any man really wants to be married to someone who mothers him.
They lost themselves.... I can't imagine how hard it would be to have cameras in my house all the time. I would not want the circus to be a reality show. I would be tagged "mean" immediately
Being the mother of seven children....five of them living at home, I understand the need for some sort of order! Nobody else in this family of artist/dreamers seems to care if the floor is spotless or they are sticking to it, if they have clean clothes or they go bare, if dinner is homecooked or cold and fast. I suppose I should be SO GRATEFUL! and to a degree, I am. But with this "easygoingness" comes a price. I am the sole housekeeper. It gets really frustrating when I am trying to get something accomplished that anyone could help me with really but I am left to do it myself. I want to scream (and sometimes I do). I want to control my husband!!! Yell at him, maybe throw in a degrading stab. Then, I come to my senses! I wouldn't trade my husband for a clean house! That is where Kate has stumbled. She has not come to her senses and apparently nobody around her has told her she needs to snap out of it. All of us get cranky and unpleasant when we are stressed and tired. Why on earth would you let a camera capture this and then show it to the world? I don't even like the fact that I think such things much less would share them with millions of people. I understand she's been making personal appearances and doing inspirational speaking. I don't understand why any young woman would want to listen to her after she has told a babysitter that the kids' daddy is stupid! If this kind of behavior is the trend of young Christian wives we are in for some troubling times.
I don't ever excuse infidelity. Jon has been accused of having an affair (when has he had time?). I think maybe he admitted it I don't know but Kate has treated him like a child and he's gone out and acted like an adolescent...who is surprised? I'm not saying this is Kate's fault! But do you think Jon didn't think he would get caught? I believe he wanted to get caught...maybe Kate would see that he is a man that someone else would be interested in. She certainly didn't seem to see him as anyone desirable.
So back to the point...
Jon and Kate can make this work. They both need to seek some good GODLY advice from someone who has survived a large family.
They need to start over as a couple. I know that you can't just be parents and survive as lovers.
Their kids deserve to see a loving relationship between their parents and not just teamwork or cooperation. Kids want their parents to love each other!
Kate needs to get over her obsession with perfection.
Jon needs to grow up.
Other than that, they need to remember that everything they've been given is a gift from God. They should respect that he allowed all those babies to live for a reason. They grow up so fast and then you are left standing in the driveway wondering where the years went. In their case they will most likely all leave at the same time!!!!!
I pray they get it together. How will there be a show if there is no Jon and Kate. I could not get excited about a season of divorce court. The whole attraction was the family! Maybe it's time to pull the plug on the camera. I'd gladly give up the entertainment to see them survive.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
The Long Wait
I stumbled onto a new blog this morning. I was reading the BigHouse blog and remembered that Micah had told me about the blog she'd found called "Whispers of a former foster child". I added it to my list and read some posts. I am in awe of any adult who makes it out of the system and has good things to say about being a foster child. This person has a good outlook on her life, thank God.
It is no wonder kids say foster care was Hell. Do you know that for the record, foster children are considered "homeless"? We filled out "free/reduced price lunch forms" when we first got our kids because we had six in school and frankly would have probably qualified even if some weren't "foster" children. We were told right away that foster children in Alabama always got free lunch at school....I found out later that it was because they were considered "homeless". Our kids are far from homeless now but until that final court declares their mother's termination of rights fully legal and binding we wait. We have been told that it could take up to two MORE years before we can adopt these children. That will mean that they would have been foster children for five and a half years! Is there anything right about this? ANYTHING legal and just? There are five girls in our case who are in families who want to adopt them but in order to dot i's and cross t's we have to just wait. All the rights in the world are granted the birth parents who's behavior cost them their children but no rights are given to the children who want to belong to a family. It really burns me.
I am thankful for people like Victoria Rowell, former foster child, and the writer of "Whispers of a former foster child" for helping us as foster families to understand how to go around the court system and policies to really make these kids feel as if they belong to us. We of course feel that they do. BUT, I can't tell you that we don't live in constant fear that "they" will come and take them away from us. We have no rights if "they" do. We are just volunteers at the mercy of the state. I know there are foster parents who do this for the wrong reasons...there will always be people who do all sorts of things for the wrong reasons but I can't be responsible for any behavior other than my own. We do this because we feel that God called us to. Pure and simple. I am almost fifty years old and have lots of things I could be doing other than foster parenting! But I feel that I have a purpose. These little girls have to have someone who will say.."ENOUGH!" Enough poverty, enough shame, enough abuse and neglect.
They deserve to be loved! They deserve to have pretty clothes and birthday parties and friends! They deserve a life of joy not shame! They have nothing to be ashamed of! They did not ask for any of their prior life.
I am praying that someone in power will hear us and stop the long wait for adoption. If we can get children out of the foster system sooner they will have a better chance at a whole life.
It is no wonder kids say foster care was Hell. Do you know that for the record, foster children are considered "homeless"? We filled out "free/reduced price lunch forms" when we first got our kids because we had six in school and frankly would have probably qualified even if some weren't "foster" children. We were told right away that foster children in Alabama always got free lunch at school....I found out later that it was because they were considered "homeless". Our kids are far from homeless now but until that final court declares their mother's termination of rights fully legal and binding we wait. We have been told that it could take up to two MORE years before we can adopt these children. That will mean that they would have been foster children for five and a half years! Is there anything right about this? ANYTHING legal and just? There are five girls in our case who are in families who want to adopt them but in order to dot i's and cross t's we have to just wait. All the rights in the world are granted the birth parents who's behavior cost them their children but no rights are given to the children who want to belong to a family. It really burns me.
I am thankful for people like Victoria Rowell, former foster child, and the writer of "Whispers of a former foster child" for helping us as foster families to understand how to go around the court system and policies to really make these kids feel as if they belong to us. We of course feel that they do. BUT, I can't tell you that we don't live in constant fear that "they" will come and take them away from us. We have no rights if "they" do. We are just volunteers at the mercy of the state. I know there are foster parents who do this for the wrong reasons...there will always be people who do all sorts of things for the wrong reasons but I can't be responsible for any behavior other than my own. We do this because we feel that God called us to. Pure and simple. I am almost fifty years old and have lots of things I could be doing other than foster parenting! But I feel that I have a purpose. These little girls have to have someone who will say.."ENOUGH!" Enough poverty, enough shame, enough abuse and neglect.
They deserve to be loved! They deserve to have pretty clothes and birthday parties and friends! They deserve a life of joy not shame! They have nothing to be ashamed of! They did not ask for any of their prior life.
I am praying that someone in power will hear us and stop the long wait for adoption. If we can get children out of the foster system sooner they will have a better chance at a whole life.
Saturday, May 23, 2009
Family (and others you discover at weddings)
I helped with a young cousin's wedding this weekend. It was my anniversary with my sweet husband yesterday so we spent part of it rehearsing the young couples' ceremony. It was all fine, I did flowers for three days, worked my behind off as usual when I undertake these things, then today for the real thing I was the "director". I say that lightly because I'm not my friend Terri, who is what I would consider a professional director of weddings. She has it all down to an art, with her bag of everything from rubber bands to super glue to WD-40. She is the McGeiver (sp?) of weddings...you know, can fix anything with a shoestring and white school glue...she comes prepared. I put a plastic bag in my purse with some bandaids, Excedrine, a couple of safety pins and a needle and thread. I prayed no body would need anything else. Nobody did. The problem I had with directing had nothing to do with headaches or a torn seam. The weather was our foe today. We had known it was likely to rain. Problem was it rained, then stopped, then rained, then stopped. We really didn't have a contingency plan. The venue was very limited....either we held the wedding outside under a tent with chairs or inside with everybody standing up trying to see. Everybody seemed to think I had the answer. I did not. I was just the person they decided to follow. So I made the decision to have the ceremony inside. It was raining buckets at 4:45. The wedding was at 6. We brought flowers and a few chairs inside. Then the sun came out for the first time all day. I was asked why we were having the service inside. I changed it back to the original outside at the very last minute.....as the dark clouds came rolling back into the picture. Long story short, the wedding party was escorted under the tent with umbrellas. The wedding took place, it was beautiful. My sweet love delivered a precious charge to the couple and had them repeat their vows. The rain stopped and everything was fine. I could breathe.
Then a really nice thing happened. I noticed all three of my cousins who lived next door to me as a child were standing within five feet of me. This is so significant because we have probably not all been in the same room in 30 years. It's complicated. We all have our issues and just have lost touch. I was so thrilled that without even thinking I yelled that somebody needed to get a camera! It was like I was Wendy from Peter Pan and all of a sudden I was back with the lost boys on an adventure in Neverland. We all looked like adults....but I was 10! We got the picture, made small talk, laughed and moved on to other people. Later, as the DJ played favorite dance tunes from the 70's and 80's I laughed and sang along as my uncle took the floor with his precious great granddaughter Allana. There has been some distance between her mother and the older people in our family but there was no distance tonight. Everybody celebrated, everybody laughed. Rain or shine, life goes on. People can decide not to see each other, not to talk. We can decide to shut people out of our lives for whatever reason but I hope tonight was a start of laughter to come.
Before I left, one of my cousins hugged me and said "I do love you, you know." Huh, I didn't know, but it was good to hear. I told her that I loved her too and we needed to stick together. We are getting older, we need each other, if for no other reason to remind each other that we are part of something far bigger than ourselves.
Thank you God for weddings, for family, for a chance to celebrate 27 years of one marriage and the beginning of another, for that little girl with brown skin dancing and all who saw her as she is....a beautiful continuation of us.
Then a really nice thing happened. I noticed all three of my cousins who lived next door to me as a child were standing within five feet of me. This is so significant because we have probably not all been in the same room in 30 years. It's complicated. We all have our issues and just have lost touch. I was so thrilled that without even thinking I yelled that somebody needed to get a camera! It was like I was Wendy from Peter Pan and all of a sudden I was back with the lost boys on an adventure in Neverland. We all looked like adults....but I was 10! We got the picture, made small talk, laughed and moved on to other people. Later, as the DJ played favorite dance tunes from the 70's and 80's I laughed and sang along as my uncle took the floor with his precious great granddaughter Allana. There has been some distance between her mother and the older people in our family but there was no distance tonight. Everybody celebrated, everybody laughed. Rain or shine, life goes on. People can decide not to see each other, not to talk. We can decide to shut people out of our lives for whatever reason but I hope tonight was a start of laughter to come.
Before I left, one of my cousins hugged me and said "I do love you, you know." Huh, I didn't know, but it was good to hear. I told her that I loved her too and we needed to stick together. We are getting older, we need each other, if for no other reason to remind each other that we are part of something far bigger than ourselves.
Thank you God for weddings, for family, for a chance to celebrate 27 years of one marriage and the beginning of another, for that little girl with brown skin dancing and all who saw her as she is....a beautiful continuation of us.
Sunday, May 17, 2009
A Day in the Life
May is foster care appreciation month. It is a very busy month with graduations, Mother's Day, school ending and tons of other things that seem to happen at the end of the school year. I thought it might be interesting for people who say "I could NEVER be a foster parent!" to actually know what we do go through on a given day. There is no such thing as a typical day, but here are some possibilities that have actually happened to either me personally or my foster mom friends.
6am (or earlier, depending on if you work outside the home and have to look presentable when dropping kids off at school)-Up, putting together outfits, socks & shoes for little ones who may have never felt the importance of looking cute at school before...we want them to because we love them.
Prepare breakfast- Some protein because little ADD brains function better with protein in bellies...most of our kids end up being diagnosed with ADHD even if we think they aren't. But it doesn't hurt any of our kids to have a decent breakfast...we do that because maybe nobody in their past has ever made sure they ate breakfast before and we know they need it.
Help them dress, if needed. Brush hair, teeth.....remind them to pick up pajamas, tie shoes, check book bags for signed notes, library books, ice cream money.
Drive them to school, pray, hug, kiss, encourage. Blow kisses as they look back one last time, give them the thumbs up and pray again.
To the countless moms who then drive to work....you have my utmost respect!!!
Return home...listen to Bible study online while loading dishwasher, washing machine, answer endless questions from preschooler who "once upon a time" didn't talk but now has discovered the fun of hearing you say "Uh huh" a thousand times a day. Make beds, pick up toys, clothes, candy wrappers (wonder where those came from).
Then the phone....talk to caseworkers, make appointments, encourage new foster moms, cry with old foster moms. Receive calls from schools, sometimes one a day saying someone has forgotten something or has a tummy ache or head ache or some unspecified illness....or heaven forbid (but it happens) someone is in trouble and will be suspended for three days...
More housework, dress, off to meetings, volunteering at the Big House clothes closet, grocery shopping for a huge family that seems to never stop eating...on rare occasions catching lunch with another foster mom...this is a real treat!
More phone calls, arranging visits with birthparents, siblings, therapists, doctors.
Pick up at school(s) One year I had five different schools! This can take up to an hour in itself...this is when a foster mom has to be creative and have something to do in the car for each age group or you have all out war. I bought a DVD player...best investment ever!
Drive to visits....sometimes these kids have two visits a week with birthparents or siblings.
Help with homework, prepare snack of some kind, encourage outdoor activities....supervised of course! Drive to practices....soccer, dance, music.
Prepare healthy dinner....hope they eat it.
Assist with bathtime, provide comfy pj's (that you will end up picking up in the morning)
Read book(s). Check homework, hugs and kisses, listen to more preschool questions. Say prayers.
Once they are in bed...
clean up after dinner, fold laundry, pick up toys left.
Maybe squeeze a little time in for your birth children...
Fall into bed exhausted.
This is during the school year....summer is a whole new experience.
Other things that happen but thankfully not every day:
headlice (one of ours has had them twice)
stomach viruses...that go through the whole family and usually hit in the middle of the night.
drawing on the house and car with a sharpie
hiding until the entire family is hysterical
parking the bike behind the car to see what happens
cutting sister's hair
pouring an entire bag of chocolate chips in bed
pulling a new tv off the wall at 5am
being awaken to the Lion King being watched at 3am
soiling clothes at six
wetting pants at seven (thankfully I think we have moved on from this)
breaking toys
breaking everything
I am sure my foster parent friends could add lots to this list...I could too if I weren't exhausted.
After saying all this I have to add that we get lots of love and joy from these kids. They are so worth the effort. It is the absolute hardest job I've ever tried to do but it is so rewarding when they hug you and say "I love you!" or when you attend a school program and see that little face find you in the crowd and light up because she knows you are there just to see her!!
So, do you think you have the stuff to do this job? I wouldn't recommend it without divine direction! But if that call comes, answer it.
6am (or earlier, depending on if you work outside the home and have to look presentable when dropping kids off at school)-Up, putting together outfits, socks & shoes for little ones who may have never felt the importance of looking cute at school before...we want them to because we love them.
Prepare breakfast- Some protein because little ADD brains function better with protein in bellies...most of our kids end up being diagnosed with ADHD even if we think they aren't. But it doesn't hurt any of our kids to have a decent breakfast...we do that because maybe nobody in their past has ever made sure they ate breakfast before and we know they need it.
Help them dress, if needed. Brush hair, teeth.....remind them to pick up pajamas, tie shoes, check book bags for signed notes, library books, ice cream money.
Drive them to school, pray, hug, kiss, encourage. Blow kisses as they look back one last time, give them the thumbs up and pray again.
To the countless moms who then drive to work....you have my utmost respect!!!
Return home...listen to Bible study online while loading dishwasher, washing machine, answer endless questions from preschooler who "once upon a time" didn't talk but now has discovered the fun of hearing you say "Uh huh" a thousand times a day. Make beds, pick up toys, clothes, candy wrappers (wonder where those came from).
Then the phone....talk to caseworkers, make appointments, encourage new foster moms, cry with old foster moms. Receive calls from schools, sometimes one a day saying someone has forgotten something or has a tummy ache or head ache or some unspecified illness....or heaven forbid (but it happens) someone is in trouble and will be suspended for three days...
More housework, dress, off to meetings, volunteering at the Big House clothes closet, grocery shopping for a huge family that seems to never stop eating...on rare occasions catching lunch with another foster mom...this is a real treat!
More phone calls, arranging visits with birthparents, siblings, therapists, doctors.
Pick up at school(s) One year I had five different schools! This can take up to an hour in itself...this is when a foster mom has to be creative and have something to do in the car for each age group or you have all out war. I bought a DVD player...best investment ever!
Drive to visits....sometimes these kids have two visits a week with birthparents or siblings.
Help with homework, prepare snack of some kind, encourage outdoor activities....supervised of course! Drive to practices....soccer, dance, music.
Prepare healthy dinner....hope they eat it.
Assist with bathtime, provide comfy pj's (that you will end up picking up in the morning)
Read book(s). Check homework, hugs and kisses, listen to more preschool questions. Say prayers.
Once they are in bed...
clean up after dinner, fold laundry, pick up toys left.
Maybe squeeze a little time in for your birth children...
Fall into bed exhausted.
This is during the school year....summer is a whole new experience.
Other things that happen but thankfully not every day:
headlice (one of ours has had them twice)
stomach viruses...that go through the whole family and usually hit in the middle of the night.
drawing on the house and car with a sharpie
hiding until the entire family is hysterical
parking the bike behind the car to see what happens
cutting sister's hair
pouring an entire bag of chocolate chips in bed
pulling a new tv off the wall at 5am
being awaken to the Lion King being watched at 3am
soiling clothes at six
wetting pants at seven (thankfully I think we have moved on from this)
breaking toys
breaking everything
I am sure my foster parent friends could add lots to this list...I could too if I weren't exhausted.
After saying all this I have to add that we get lots of love and joy from these kids. They are so worth the effort. It is the absolute hardest job I've ever tried to do but it is so rewarding when they hug you and say "I love you!" or when you attend a school program and see that little face find you in the crowd and light up because she knows you are there just to see her!!
So, do you think you have the stuff to do this job? I wouldn't recommend it without divine direction! But if that call comes, answer it.
Saturday, May 16, 2009
My Mother's Devotional Idea
This is from Feb 13, 2009
It occurred to me the other day...there needs to be a devotional book for moms. Now, I'm certain there are lots of those already on the shelves at the bookstores, but mine would be different. It would address the needs of "special" moms. Those of us who, well, let's just say DON'T have it all together.
The last week I drove carpool I had a rather humbling experience. I usually park the car and get out to collect my girls (four of them, mine and two friends, thus the carpool). The reason I do this is because MY girls are rather wild (let me remind you that though I did not give birth to these children it does not mean they haven't picked up a thing or two under my roof). Last year for instance, while I was waiting in the pick up line I witnessed, to my horror, Ariel climbing the only little spindly tree in the school yard. I think Cheyenne was running around it like an Indian, I'm not entirely sure because it was at this point that I put a bag over my head in hopes of either suffocating, or at least being unrecognizable by the teachers who were glaring at me.( Now that I think about it I have regular humbling experiences.) Anyway, after that I decided it would be better to just meet trouble head on, beside that tree, every afternoon. On this particular day I had a feeling I was going to be just a tad late. I am never late, well almost never, but on this day I was like an Olympic fraction of a second late and I got stuck in the parking lot driveway. This makes the traffic one way and you guessed it I was going the wrong way. There is a teacher who directs traffic standing in the parking lot. It is up to his discretion who goes when. First, a few pick up people got to go, then (here's the humbling part) he let the entire parking lot empty out. I had to just sit there and take it....one by one all the other mommies, the on time mommies, the got it all together mommies passed me by. Some of them smiled a sympathetic "I've been there" smile. Some totally ignored me as if I were invisible (God bless them!). But some, looked at me with a look of superiority. They were saying to themselves and maybe even their children,"Look at THAT mom, she was late, that's why she has to sit there in 'carpool timeout'. She's one of those 'can't get it all together moms'...now kids, do your homework and eat your vegetables and when you grow up you won't be one of those 'sitting in timeout moms'!" I got a little mad. I could see their disapproving stares. I had never been late before! Where was the love? And just when I thought it couldn't get worse...I saw that sad little tree swaying with my blonde monkey girl hanging from it! ARGH! I couldn't do a thing. I finally got my turn to move when the principal yelled to the traffic teacher to let the dumb mom with the monkey children into the parking lot so we could load up and get out of the way!(for the record, I'm certain that Mrs Hartley loves me and wouldn't say any of those things. I do however think she told the teacher to let me in.... with her bullhorn.)
So, that is the first of many reasons why I think there needs to be a devotional book for us ADD, not on time, a little messed up, iron-less but not quite permanent pressed mothers. If anyone needs God's grace it's us. I'm oh so glad to get it and I hope I'm never caught not sharing it, especially in carpool lines.
It occurred to me the other day...there needs to be a devotional book for moms. Now, I'm certain there are lots of those already on the shelves at the bookstores, but mine would be different. It would address the needs of "special" moms. Those of us who, well, let's just say DON'T have it all together.
The last week I drove carpool I had a rather humbling experience. I usually park the car and get out to collect my girls (four of them, mine and two friends, thus the carpool). The reason I do this is because MY girls are rather wild (let me remind you that though I did not give birth to these children it does not mean they haven't picked up a thing or two under my roof). Last year for instance, while I was waiting in the pick up line I witnessed, to my horror, Ariel climbing the only little spindly tree in the school yard. I think Cheyenne was running around it like an Indian, I'm not entirely sure because it was at this point that I put a bag over my head in hopes of either suffocating, or at least being unrecognizable by the teachers who were glaring at me.( Now that I think about it I have regular humbling experiences.) Anyway, after that I decided it would be better to just meet trouble head on, beside that tree, every afternoon. On this particular day I had a feeling I was going to be just a tad late. I am never late, well almost never, but on this day I was like an Olympic fraction of a second late and I got stuck in the parking lot driveway. This makes the traffic one way and you guessed it I was going the wrong way. There is a teacher who directs traffic standing in the parking lot. It is up to his discretion who goes when. First, a few pick up people got to go, then (here's the humbling part) he let the entire parking lot empty out. I had to just sit there and take it....one by one all the other mommies, the on time mommies, the got it all together mommies passed me by. Some of them smiled a sympathetic "I've been there" smile. Some totally ignored me as if I were invisible (God bless them!). But some, looked at me with a look of superiority. They were saying to themselves and maybe even their children,"Look at THAT mom, she was late, that's why she has to sit there in 'carpool timeout'. She's one of those 'can't get it all together moms'...now kids, do your homework and eat your vegetables and when you grow up you won't be one of those 'sitting in timeout moms'!" I got a little mad. I could see their disapproving stares. I had never been late before! Where was the love? And just when I thought it couldn't get worse...I saw that sad little tree swaying with my blonde monkey girl hanging from it! ARGH! I couldn't do a thing. I finally got my turn to move when the principal yelled to the traffic teacher to let the dumb mom with the monkey children into the parking lot so we could load up and get out of the way!(for the record, I'm certain that Mrs Hartley loves me and wouldn't say any of those things. I do however think she told the teacher to let me in.... with her bullhorn.)
So, that is the first of many reasons why I think there needs to be a devotional book for us ADD, not on time, a little messed up, iron-less but not quite permanent pressed mothers. If anyone needs God's grace it's us. I'm oh so glad to get it and I hope I'm never caught not sharing it, especially in carpool lines.
What is Grace
This morning we left for school without Ariel's bookbag. We looked for it for a few minutes but it's apparently hiding somewhere again. Once, I found it in the laundry room, in a basket, under towels. How does that happen? I have stated the fact that I am not the mom with the perfect house or any real organization skills to speak of but one thing I have worked diligently to establish in this house is "The bookbags go on a hook if you aren't doing your homework!" This way we ALWAYS know where they are! I have had the kids repeat this to me many times when I might have the occasion to run into a bookbag in an inappropriate location...they don't get there by themselves....they don't walk or jump and don't decide where to "hang out". Somebody is responsible for them and nobody needs to bother anyone else's. We have the" take care of your own stuff" policy in our house....of course I am lax on socks and other articles of clothing that undoubtedly end up in front of the TV, but as a mom that kind of just comes with the territory.
But, today Ariel is at school without her bookbag.
In the car I was on my usual rant about taking responsibility for yourself and your stuff, how Mama can't think for 8 people, how I have enough to do without having to keep up with Ariel's bookbag, blah, blah, blah....
I'm sure it was somewhere around then that Ariel floated out the window, a beautiful thing about being ADD, you can just check out whenever you want (and unfortunately sometimes when you DON'T WANT) to a place where the "bluebirds fly" (gee, no wonder I identified with Dorothy as a child!) She was sitting right behind me smiling. I was a taken off guard a little...."Young lady do you hear me talking to you?!" She continued to smile and replied, not ever even hearing my question (or anything else I had been saying)
"Mom, do we get ice cream money?"
It's Friday, ice cream day at school. I usually give the girls their two quarters on the way and try to muster up a blessing of some sort to end their week with. I replied "Yes Ariel, you get your ice cream money...It was at that point I knew she would face the natural consequences for not having her bookbag. I didn't need to keep on reminding her that she had messed up. The world is plenty good at telling us we don't measure up, aren't good enough, won't ever amount to anything...that is NOT my job! I asked her if she remembered what grace was all about...she did. She told me, "Grace is when you get something good even though you don't deserve it." I have to remember that myself. I am so much slower to dish it out than gather it in.
So, once again a teachable moment is shared, and I learn the lesson.
God is not there to tongue lash us when we forget where we put something.
And his ice cream money is always there jingling in his pocket.
But, today Ariel is at school without her bookbag.
In the car I was on my usual rant about taking responsibility for yourself and your stuff, how Mama can't think for 8 people, how I have enough to do without having to keep up with Ariel's bookbag, blah, blah, blah....
I'm sure it was somewhere around then that Ariel floated out the window, a beautiful thing about being ADD, you can just check out whenever you want (and unfortunately sometimes when you DON'T WANT) to a place where the "bluebirds fly" (gee, no wonder I identified with Dorothy as a child!) She was sitting right behind me smiling. I was a taken off guard a little...."Young lady do you hear me talking to you?!" She continued to smile and replied, not ever even hearing my question (or anything else I had been saying)
"Mom, do we get ice cream money?"
It's Friday, ice cream day at school. I usually give the girls their two quarters on the way and try to muster up a blessing of some sort to end their week with. I replied "Yes Ariel, you get your ice cream money...It was at that point I knew she would face the natural consequences for not having her bookbag. I didn't need to keep on reminding her that she had messed up. The world is plenty good at telling us we don't measure up, aren't good enough, won't ever amount to anything...that is NOT my job! I asked her if she remembered what grace was all about...she did. She told me, "Grace is when you get something good even though you don't deserve it." I have to remember that myself. I am so much slower to dish it out than gather it in.
So, once again a teachable moment is shared, and I learn the lesson.
God is not there to tongue lash us when we forget where we put something.
And his ice cream money is always there jingling in his pocket.
Three Generations of Girlfriends
A long time ago God blessed me with a good girlfriend.
It was 6th grade, I had been at the infant school Lee Academy since 3rd...in third grade there were three girls, I was relieved that now there were at least seven or eight. Terri Belcher was one of the new girls. She was cute and petite, smart and popular....all the things I normally didn't like in a person. I was kind of quiet and none of those other things. I was happy to at least have other girls to walk around the playground with at recess. Terri and I weren't instant "best friends" but when you go to a school as small as ours you learn to stick up for each other outside of school a lot like siblings do.
At the end of our short elementary stint together we plowed into junior high. It wasn't all that different but we felt really grown up. I remember the style back then was short skirts and long socks...funny. Terri was a cheerleader in seventh grade....she was a cheerleader in EVERY grade. I tried out but didn't make it my first attempt...didn't have the urge again until the end of ninth grade. This is when we started hanging out more, our JV cheerleading squad was pretty tight. I saw for the first time what being a team really was. We had a lot of fun but at the end of the season I didn't want to try out again...I figured I'd let somebody else who wanted it more have my spot. Silly, I know but I had other things to do...I didn't like my legs in the uniform, I couldn't decide if I was the cheerleader type or a hippie. So, after another year of not being a cheerleader I tried it again. Our senior year was the best year of my young life. It was just about as sweet and crazy as a teenager's life gets. It was this year that Terri and I forged a friendship that would stand against the storms of life.
I had never been diagnosed with ADD but I knew something was not "normal" about the way I learned or saw the world. I had a very difficult time memorizing things. I loved art and English, could tell you any song, artist and title but forgot about economics or any math! My grades were so-so. It was a bonafide miracle that I got into college but it was something else that got me that high school diploma...I will never forget the night before our senior econ exam Terri helped me study. I even got to the point that I wanted to just give up and go to bed. Terri would shake me and say, "You are not going to sleep until you know this stuff backwards and forwards". I don't remember what my test score was but I remember Terri was as proud as any mama I knew that I at least passed the class and was allowed to graduate with the other 15. I knew she was bound to be a teacher!
I went away to school, like I said it was an act of God that got me there for sure. Terri stayed at Auburn and excelled as I knew she would. We saw each other from time to time and kept up better than most. It was around our junior year in college that she introduced me to a fiery hispanic looking cowboy named Jack. It was not a friendship made in heaven. He was the polar opposite of what I thought my best high school pal should be ending up with. He was a trash talking, wild, partying fool. I wondered what in the world Terri saw in him. You can imagine my horror when she said she was going to MARRY him! I did my best to mess that up but as they say, love is blind (I thought it had gone deaf and dumb too!) I was working at Ridgecrest Baptist Conference Center near Black Mountain, NC the summer of their wedding (I didn't recognize him as such but I had met the man of my dreams there just a few weeks earlier). I drove home, 7 hours, to be a bridesmaid in what I thought was going to be a record short marriage. I drove during the night and dropped a friend off in Atlanta. By the time I got home I could not talk...at all. I'm sure it was just God telling me that he was in charge and I needed to keep my mouth out of his plan. Even at cheer camps I had never lost my voice. Now I was a mute and my sweet friend was getting married in two days. That was the first lesson I learned about staying out of God's way when Terri was concerned...instead he always prompted me to pray for her and her husband. I remember telling Jack that when I had my baby he was not coming into my house with that foul mouth of his. I laugh out loud sometimes when I think of those days because although this note is about the relationship between "us girls" I have to say the Lord turned my hard heart to mush for Jack. After a while Jesus saved him and boy what a transformation. There are only a few men I would trust the way I would Jack now. He used to sing a song that would just destroy my makeup not long after he found the Lord. It said "the greatest of all miracles was when God saved me, yes I know what Jesus did for me." I knew too and it was a beautiful thing.
Back to the story, I had that baby I threatened to never let Jack talk to... Hannah. A few months after she was born a little blonde spitball named Dacy was born to the Rubios. Terri and I joked that Dacy and Hannah HAD to be friends, we just wouldn't have it any other way. We didn't even have to push them, they were like night and day and loved each other like two puppies or maybe one puppy and a bit of a wild cat. I have so many happy memories of all three of our girls playing and growing up in church together. They also went to the same little school similar to how Terri and I started out. The girls were so much fun as teenagers and were pretty close...until the boy came along. His name was Robert and Hannah just didn't know what to make of Dacy with a serious boyfriend and someone who seemed so different from her...are you starting to see a pattern? Hannah cried like a lost child during Dacy's wedding but learned in a short time that God's hand was just as much in her sweet friend's life as he had been in her mother's.
Hannah married her true love a couple of years later and was the first of the two to start a family. Dacy was there with Hannah during the early stages of labor on March 11, 2008 when our precious little Aiden Elizabeth was born. She was a rock and a comfort to us all in the waiting room. She even came to the rescue along with Aunt Micah a few days later when Aidie's daddy got a stomach bug and couldn't take care of his girls for a day or two. I knew if Hannah had Dacy close she would be okay. Then the news that rocked all of us, Hannah and Michael and baby Aiden were moving to Virginia. Dacy and I both grieved and wanted it not to be true but it was once again a God thing that was gonna have to happen. The shoe was on the other foot so to speak because Terri wanted to tell them it was a mistake and Dacy prayed they would stay but they both fell mute when trying to talk to Hannah about it. It didn't matter just like it hadn't mattered what I thought about Jack we all have to do what we have to do. It's all about what God whispers in each one's ear. We would all be better for listening to him in the end.
Dacy helped my Michael and me by announcing that she was pregnant! At first they weren't going to find out what the baby was but her sweet Rob was a mess not knowing. When we first heard she was a girl I rejoiced that baby Aiden would have a girlfriend! A third generation girlfriend...little did we know that the little baby Dacy was carrying had a point to prove. She was due April first, anyone who knows Dacy had to laugh a little to hear this. I love that girl with my heart and one of her best qualities is she can act like a fool (she gets it from her daddy). She is FUN, yep, all caps. I thought it was very appropriate for her baby to have this due date and didn't think about it again until Hannah called me on her way to Alabama for spring break and to celebrate Aidie's birthday in March!! Dacy had been in labor! She had gone to the hospital a couple of times but it looked like she was going to have her baby on March 11, one year to the day of Aiden's birthday. Words cannot describe how that felt to us. It was a miracle! Hannah would not only BE THERE which she had so wanted but just knew she would miss, but she would forever be bonded to Dacy in a new way...babies with the same birthday.
Of course I juggled everything my life holds to get to Birmingham that day and I did only a couple of hours after Dacy Caroline was born. I got to hug my two babies, my best lifelong friend and her two babies all in a matter of minutes. It was a happy moment for all of us.
I think about what the future holds for these two little girls. I picture them as old women after their Grammies are memories and their sweet mothers have joined us once again. I see them sitting together laughing over one cake their joined families have brought for them. I see them there with a twinkle in their eyes that only comes from years of happy times. They have so much together and between them. Grade school, summers, secrets, inside jokes, clothes and shoes, a tank of gas, a box of Kleenex, boys who were wrong and ones who were right, weddings, babies, death and life and knowing someone so well, and sharing so much... good and sometimes not so good but loving just the same.
I see a deep connection that few get to experience, one born from God that goes back three generations.
It was 6th grade, I had been at the infant school Lee Academy since 3rd...in third grade there were three girls, I was relieved that now there were at least seven or eight. Terri Belcher was one of the new girls. She was cute and petite, smart and popular....all the things I normally didn't like in a person. I was kind of quiet and none of those other things. I was happy to at least have other girls to walk around the playground with at recess. Terri and I weren't instant "best friends" but when you go to a school as small as ours you learn to stick up for each other outside of school a lot like siblings do.
At the end of our short elementary stint together we plowed into junior high. It wasn't all that different but we felt really grown up. I remember the style back then was short skirts and long socks...funny. Terri was a cheerleader in seventh grade....she was a cheerleader in EVERY grade. I tried out but didn't make it my first attempt...didn't have the urge again until the end of ninth grade. This is when we started hanging out more, our JV cheerleading squad was pretty tight. I saw for the first time what being a team really was. We had a lot of fun but at the end of the season I didn't want to try out again...I figured I'd let somebody else who wanted it more have my spot. Silly, I know but I had other things to do...I didn't like my legs in the uniform, I couldn't decide if I was the cheerleader type or a hippie. So, after another year of not being a cheerleader I tried it again. Our senior year was the best year of my young life. It was just about as sweet and crazy as a teenager's life gets. It was this year that Terri and I forged a friendship that would stand against the storms of life.
I had never been diagnosed with ADD but I knew something was not "normal" about the way I learned or saw the world. I had a very difficult time memorizing things. I loved art and English, could tell you any song, artist and title but forgot about economics or any math! My grades were so-so. It was a bonafide miracle that I got into college but it was something else that got me that high school diploma...I will never forget the night before our senior econ exam Terri helped me study. I even got to the point that I wanted to just give up and go to bed. Terri would shake me and say, "You are not going to sleep until you know this stuff backwards and forwards". I don't remember what my test score was but I remember Terri was as proud as any mama I knew that I at least passed the class and was allowed to graduate with the other 15. I knew she was bound to be a teacher!
I went away to school, like I said it was an act of God that got me there for sure. Terri stayed at Auburn and excelled as I knew she would. We saw each other from time to time and kept up better than most. It was around our junior year in college that she introduced me to a fiery hispanic looking cowboy named Jack. It was not a friendship made in heaven. He was the polar opposite of what I thought my best high school pal should be ending up with. He was a trash talking, wild, partying fool. I wondered what in the world Terri saw in him. You can imagine my horror when she said she was going to MARRY him! I did my best to mess that up but as they say, love is blind (I thought it had gone deaf and dumb too!) I was working at Ridgecrest Baptist Conference Center near Black Mountain, NC the summer of their wedding (I didn't recognize him as such but I had met the man of my dreams there just a few weeks earlier). I drove home, 7 hours, to be a bridesmaid in what I thought was going to be a record short marriage. I drove during the night and dropped a friend off in Atlanta. By the time I got home I could not talk...at all. I'm sure it was just God telling me that he was in charge and I needed to keep my mouth out of his plan. Even at cheer camps I had never lost my voice. Now I was a mute and my sweet friend was getting married in two days. That was the first lesson I learned about staying out of God's way when Terri was concerned...instead he always prompted me to pray for her and her husband. I remember telling Jack that when I had my baby he was not coming into my house with that foul mouth of his. I laugh out loud sometimes when I think of those days because although this note is about the relationship between "us girls" I have to say the Lord turned my hard heart to mush for Jack. After a while Jesus saved him and boy what a transformation. There are only a few men I would trust the way I would Jack now. He used to sing a song that would just destroy my makeup not long after he found the Lord. It said "the greatest of all miracles was when God saved me, yes I know what Jesus did for me." I knew too and it was a beautiful thing.
Back to the story, I had that baby I threatened to never let Jack talk to... Hannah. A few months after she was born a little blonde spitball named Dacy was born to the Rubios. Terri and I joked that Dacy and Hannah HAD to be friends, we just wouldn't have it any other way. We didn't even have to push them, they were like night and day and loved each other like two puppies or maybe one puppy and a bit of a wild cat. I have so many happy memories of all three of our girls playing and growing up in church together. They also went to the same little school similar to how Terri and I started out. The girls were so much fun as teenagers and were pretty close...until the boy came along. His name was Robert and Hannah just didn't know what to make of Dacy with a serious boyfriend and someone who seemed so different from her...are you starting to see a pattern? Hannah cried like a lost child during Dacy's wedding but learned in a short time that God's hand was just as much in her sweet friend's life as he had been in her mother's.
Hannah married her true love a couple of years later and was the first of the two to start a family. Dacy was there with Hannah during the early stages of labor on March 11, 2008 when our precious little Aiden Elizabeth was born. She was a rock and a comfort to us all in the waiting room. She even came to the rescue along with Aunt Micah a few days later when Aidie's daddy got a stomach bug and couldn't take care of his girls for a day or two. I knew if Hannah had Dacy close she would be okay. Then the news that rocked all of us, Hannah and Michael and baby Aiden were moving to Virginia. Dacy and I both grieved and wanted it not to be true but it was once again a God thing that was gonna have to happen. The shoe was on the other foot so to speak because Terri wanted to tell them it was a mistake and Dacy prayed they would stay but they both fell mute when trying to talk to Hannah about it. It didn't matter just like it hadn't mattered what I thought about Jack we all have to do what we have to do. It's all about what God whispers in each one's ear. We would all be better for listening to him in the end.
Dacy helped my Michael and me by announcing that she was pregnant! At first they weren't going to find out what the baby was but her sweet Rob was a mess not knowing. When we first heard she was a girl I rejoiced that baby Aiden would have a girlfriend! A third generation girlfriend...little did we know that the little baby Dacy was carrying had a point to prove. She was due April first, anyone who knows Dacy had to laugh a little to hear this. I love that girl with my heart and one of her best qualities is she can act like a fool (she gets it from her daddy). She is FUN, yep, all caps. I thought it was very appropriate for her baby to have this due date and didn't think about it again until Hannah called me on her way to Alabama for spring break and to celebrate Aidie's birthday in March!! Dacy had been in labor! She had gone to the hospital a couple of times but it looked like she was going to have her baby on March 11, one year to the day of Aiden's birthday. Words cannot describe how that felt to us. It was a miracle! Hannah would not only BE THERE which she had so wanted but just knew she would miss, but she would forever be bonded to Dacy in a new way...babies with the same birthday.
Of course I juggled everything my life holds to get to Birmingham that day and I did only a couple of hours after Dacy Caroline was born. I got to hug my two babies, my best lifelong friend and her two babies all in a matter of minutes. It was a happy moment for all of us.
I think about what the future holds for these two little girls. I picture them as old women after their Grammies are memories and their sweet mothers have joined us once again. I see them sitting together laughing over one cake their joined families have brought for them. I see them there with a twinkle in their eyes that only comes from years of happy times. They have so much together and between them. Grade school, summers, secrets, inside jokes, clothes and shoes, a tank of gas, a box of Kleenex, boys who were wrong and ones who were right, weddings, babies, death and life and knowing someone so well, and sharing so much... good and sometimes not so good but loving just the same.
I see a deep connection that few get to experience, one born from God that goes back three generations.
Dacy Caroline and Aiden's birthday!
Friday, May 15, 2009
Cheyenne the Dancer
I haven't really written much about Cheyenne. She is more quiet than Ariel (thank God!) and she's not quite as mischievous as Felicity. I don't mean to leave her out but she just seems to go with the family flow and doesn't draw a whole lot of attention to herself.
She is a sweet kid. When she gets the rare opportunity to have one of us to herself she is the most pleasant little thing you would ever meet...She wasn't always this way but it didn't take her long to calm down and just "chill" as the boys are always saying. Her favorite phrase the first six months or so after we got her was "I don't want to!" It was usually accompanied by jerking her hand away from us and collapsing into a heap. The first sunday at church she went potty in her pants. The kind church workers simply put a new pair of underwear on her and didn't say one word...the only way I even knew what had happened was they handed me a zipper bag with her washed out tights in them and she had on black patent leather shoes with no socks in January, tough lesson, cold legs, she never did it again...at church anyway. I got used to poop. This was Cheyenne's way of punishing me. It was something she had control over. The last time she did this was one afternoon in the spring of that first year...they called me from school and told me she had really messed up her pants and didn't have anything to change into (had already used that back up outfit). I told them to just let her sit in the bathroom I'd be there in a couple of minutes...I literally was. I asked for a box of wipes and a trash bag. I went into the bathroom with her handed her the wipes and the bag and told her to get to cleaning herself up....oh boy, you would have thought the world collided with a meteor. She went to wailing and crying but she cleaned herself and half the bathroom. It was terrible, the smell was horrific but she did it. My good friend Sharon Lofton had told me this would work and it did! Never happened again.
I remember the first couple of days with all the kids Cheyenne had some really cute quips and quotes that I swore I wouldn't forget but have escaped me. One night as I was trying to comfort Lissy with her double ear infections she came up the stairs...with each new step she would stomp loud and say "Mom", she had formed a rhythm by the time she reached the top...stomp,mom,stomp,mom....when she saw me she noticed I was rocking Lissy and whispered..."Tan we have some poptorn?" I whispered back to go ask Dad. She started back down the stairs with the same stomp step but this time it was stomp,dad,stomp,dad,stomp,dad...so cute...oh and one more. She came downstairs just majorly upset because she said Ariel had "throwed up on her buutt" this was pronounced like butt with a little more ew. We thought she was saying Ariel threw up on her butt. I looked at her pj's, no throw up...I asked Ariel if she had thrown up on Cheyenne's butt, she said no mam! Ariel had been coughing so we didn't know if it happened or not...Cheyenne finally told us she would show us! And on a BOOK in her room there was maybe a tiny little bit of spit where Ariel had coughed on Cheyenne's book, not her butt. Whew, that would have been a nasty mess to clean up!
After a while there were no more poop or vomit stories....we moved on the head lice. Cheyenne had them twice. Lovely. She got them at daycare. The first time they spread to Lissy but that was all. We picked and washed linens for a week. It was horrible. Cheyenne has very pretty hair and I was just not willing to cut the critters out of it. It was nice weather so we sat out in the sun so we could see them better. I have to stop and thank my sister-in-law Beth for a favor she did me a long time ago....if she reads this she'll know what that was ...many thanks sister friend :)
I have to say our life with Cheyenne has greatly improved. She is so prissy and would probably be my least likely child to want to get really yucky dirty today. She has developed into quite the little diva. She can walk better in high heels than I ever could! She loves pretty clothes and enjoys long sessions in the mirror. Her new best friend Jaimes Kaitlyn Smith is a prissy thing too so they have a great time. She is so loving and affectionate. We all love this about her. Every morning when she gets out of the car for school she turns and gives me the hand sign for I love you..... then prisses off in her little platform sandles...so cute.
We've decided she's got a future in dance....maybe not the NYC Ballet but perhaps a hiphop troup for Jesus! She's got the moves!
She is a sweet kid. When she gets the rare opportunity to have one of us to herself she is the most pleasant little thing you would ever meet...She wasn't always this way but it didn't take her long to calm down and just "chill" as the boys are always saying. Her favorite phrase the first six months or so after we got her was "I don't want to!" It was usually accompanied by jerking her hand away from us and collapsing into a heap. The first sunday at church she went potty in her pants. The kind church workers simply put a new pair of underwear on her and didn't say one word...the only way I even knew what had happened was they handed me a zipper bag with her washed out tights in them and she had on black patent leather shoes with no socks in January, tough lesson, cold legs, she never did it again...at church anyway. I got used to poop. This was Cheyenne's way of punishing me. It was something she had control over. The last time she did this was one afternoon in the spring of that first year...they called me from school and told me she had really messed up her pants and didn't have anything to change into (had already used that back up outfit). I told them to just let her sit in the bathroom I'd be there in a couple of minutes...I literally was. I asked for a box of wipes and a trash bag. I went into the bathroom with her handed her the wipes and the bag and told her to get to cleaning herself up....oh boy, you would have thought the world collided with a meteor. She went to wailing and crying but she cleaned herself and half the bathroom. It was terrible, the smell was horrific but she did it. My good friend Sharon Lofton had told me this would work and it did! Never happened again.
I remember the first couple of days with all the kids Cheyenne had some really cute quips and quotes that I swore I wouldn't forget but have escaped me. One night as I was trying to comfort Lissy with her double ear infections she came up the stairs...with each new step she would stomp loud and say "Mom", she had formed a rhythm by the time she reached the top...stomp,mom,stomp,mom....when she saw me she noticed I was rocking Lissy and whispered..."Tan we have some poptorn?" I whispered back to go ask Dad. She started back down the stairs with the same stomp step but this time it was stomp,dad,stomp,dad,stomp,dad...so cute...oh and one more. She came downstairs just majorly upset because she said Ariel had "throwed up on her buutt" this was pronounced like butt with a little more ew. We thought she was saying Ariel threw up on her butt. I looked at her pj's, no throw up...I asked Ariel if she had thrown up on Cheyenne's butt, she said no mam! Ariel had been coughing so we didn't know if it happened or not...Cheyenne finally told us she would show us! And on a BOOK in her room there was maybe a tiny little bit of spit where Ariel had coughed on Cheyenne's book, not her butt. Whew, that would have been a nasty mess to clean up!
After a while there were no more poop or vomit stories....we moved on the head lice. Cheyenne had them twice. Lovely. She got them at daycare. The first time they spread to Lissy but that was all. We picked and washed linens for a week. It was horrible. Cheyenne has very pretty hair and I was just not willing to cut the critters out of it. It was nice weather so we sat out in the sun so we could see them better. I have to stop and thank my sister-in-law Beth for a favor she did me a long time ago....if she reads this she'll know what that was ...many thanks sister friend :)
I have to say our life with Cheyenne has greatly improved. She is so prissy and would probably be my least likely child to want to get really yucky dirty today. She has developed into quite the little diva. She can walk better in high heels than I ever could! She loves pretty clothes and enjoys long sessions in the mirror. Her new best friend Jaimes Kaitlyn Smith is a prissy thing too so they have a great time. She is so loving and affectionate. We all love this about her. Every morning when she gets out of the car for school she turns and gives me the hand sign for I love you..... then prisses off in her little platform sandles...so cute.
We've decided she's got a future in dance....maybe not the NYC Ballet but perhaps a hiphop troup for Jesus! She's got the moves!
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
The Beginning of Summer....whew!
This school year is almost over and I am glad! It's been very good, don't get me wrong, but I am ready to have the girls at home in the mornings with nowhere to rush them off to. And don't even get me started on trying to get two teenage boys up and out the door! I am tired! I am ready to get outside and garden and play in the sprinkler (well not really ME but the girls).
As many of you know Jon went to live in another foster home the beginning of April. There has been a very sweet calm in our house ever since. It is sad to have to let him move on but it was necessary. He is being treated in a residential program right now and I am told he has had an initial diagnosis so I am rejoicing that a professional has seen some of what we saw. Please continue to pray for him.
We are all so excited that Micah graduated from U of A last Saturday! It was extra special to have Blake get his Master's degree the same day. We are proud of all our Bama graduates! This makes four with Hannah and Michael (Sewell). Now I am looking forward to Micah and Blake moving to Opelika and Hannah and Michael moving at least a little closer to home (we hope!).
Matthan and Seth auditioned for the fall play at OHS. They are doing "The Man Who Came to Dinner". I haven't ever seen it but I hear it's pretty funny. Seth was cast as "Beverly" and Matthan is "Bert". I'm sure it will be another outstanding Gholston production.
Trumbauer auditions are today. If you aren't familiar with high school theatre, Trumbauer is a competition class Revel teaches. They take a one act play to district then if they place, which they usually do, take it to state. There are also individual and duet competitions. Last year Matthan won 1st place in the state competition for Male Novice Solo Contemporary! We were so excited and happy for him. He is very serious about acting and does an excellent job.... if you saw him in Les Mis you know what I mean :) Now, Seth is getting into the act...pardon the pun. I look forward to lots more productions and becoming quite a stage mom!
This post was pretty much just news from the homefront. I hope to write lots of stories on here. Many thanks to Hannah for setting me up with a blog...I sure got tired of writing for hours on facebook to click the wrong key and POOF, having it gone! Very discouraging! Hannah assures me that even if my computer crashes my lovely little notes will be floating out there in Cyberspace! Yea!
As many of you know Jon went to live in another foster home the beginning of April. There has been a very sweet calm in our house ever since. It is sad to have to let him move on but it was necessary. He is being treated in a residential program right now and I am told he has had an initial diagnosis so I am rejoicing that a professional has seen some of what we saw. Please continue to pray for him.
We are all so excited that Micah graduated from U of A last Saturday! It was extra special to have Blake get his Master's degree the same day. We are proud of all our Bama graduates! This makes four with Hannah and Michael (Sewell). Now I am looking forward to Micah and Blake moving to Opelika and Hannah and Michael moving at least a little closer to home (we hope!).
Matthan and Seth auditioned for the fall play at OHS. They are doing "The Man Who Came to Dinner". I haven't ever seen it but I hear it's pretty funny. Seth was cast as "Beverly" and Matthan is "Bert". I'm sure it will be another outstanding Gholston production.
Trumbauer auditions are today. If you aren't familiar with high school theatre, Trumbauer is a competition class Revel teaches. They take a one act play to district then if they place, which they usually do, take it to state. There are also individual and duet competitions. Last year Matthan won 1st place in the state competition for Male Novice Solo Contemporary! We were so excited and happy for him. He is very serious about acting and does an excellent job.... if you saw him in Les Mis you know what I mean :) Now, Seth is getting into the act...pardon the pun. I look forward to lots more productions and becoming quite a stage mom!
This post was pretty much just news from the homefront. I hope to write lots of stories on here. Many thanks to Hannah for setting me up with a blog...I sure got tired of writing for hours on facebook to click the wrong key and POOF, having it gone! Very discouraging! Hannah assures me that even if my computer crashes my lovely little notes will be floating out there in Cyberspace! Yea!
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
How I Got the Circus
When I was a kid, from my first memories I felt like I got a lot of "stuff" for Christmas but rarely anything that brought any real joy, I mean how many dolls can Santa bring? Don't get me wrong, I loved the gifts that I'm sure my mother bought all through the year in order for me to have the most wonderful Christmas mornings any child could dream of. But, my parents both had issues. My dad was a sweet man, a loving father but he was a workaholic. He was driven to work like noone I have ever seen. In a way I loved that about him because he was very creative, he built houses, and not just houses....really quality houses, beautiful homes that were crafted with love and devotion. He worked every day. Even on Christmas after I saw what Santa brought Daddy would put on his work boots and head to the lake to work on his latest masterpiece. That left me and Mama. I believe we went to my Granny's every Christmas but I don't have many memories of that, I'm not sure why, I just know we went. Anyway, getting to the circus part. I started at about 9 or 10 praying for a family. I asked God to give me a large family! I wanted the sweet husband, the dog, the cat and a house FULL of children. I think I may have even dreamed of a circus atmosphere at Christmas, all the colors and noises, a kind of chaos only the circus can bring, three rings going all at once.
As I grew older...Christmas got more and more quiet. Some of the ones from my teen years were even painfully quiet, my mother struggled with depression and sometimes she would spend much of the day in bed as anyone with depression tends to want to do at Christmas time. That would leave me to do whatever and frankly I was bored.
Okay, I know cut to the chase. When I was in college I met Michael. He was the youngest of eleven children and you can just imagine me quizing him on how crazy his Christmas's were at home. He said that actually all his siblings had married or were at least on their own so his parents spent Christmas Day visiting all the grandchildren who lived in close proximity and he either went along or hung out at the house. WHAT? He told me that his whole family got together the Saturday before Christmas but the day was more reserved for the individual families of his siblings. So....his Christmas Days were kinda boring too. As the fall progressed I grew pretty fond this guy, he must have been fond of me too because he had already mentioned that he thought we should spend the rest of our lives together (the rest of that story is for another time). As we parted for Christmas break I asked him if he would visit me during the holidays. He said he would! He even said that he could come on Christmas Day if I wanted him to. Well, I jumped at that chance. When the day actually arrived I expected him to show after lunch sometime but my phone rang a little after 8 am! It was him and he was wanting directions from the gas station about 3 miles from my house!!! We had a great time. My parents liked him and by then my dad was actually hanging around and reading the paper on Christmas.
That was the first of many great memories for me. The next Christmas we were married and we had a little Charlie Brown tree! The one after that we were expecting Hannah! The one after that we were houseparents at the Alabama Baptist Children's Home. Then Micah came along, and after a few not too quiet holidays..the boys! Now, we have the "additional 4" to add tothe "original 4" and the two sweet sons-in-law and now baby Aidie! I can't wait for this year and all the craziness involved with meals and gifts and evenings with 14 people in the immediate family! It's pretty much a circus! Thank you God.
As I grew older...Christmas got more and more quiet. Some of the ones from my teen years were even painfully quiet, my mother struggled with depression and sometimes she would spend much of the day in bed as anyone with depression tends to want to do at Christmas time. That would leave me to do whatever and frankly I was bored.
Okay, I know cut to the chase. When I was in college I met Michael. He was the youngest of eleven children and you can just imagine me quizing him on how crazy his Christmas's were at home. He said that actually all his siblings had married or were at least on their own so his parents spent Christmas Day visiting all the grandchildren who lived in close proximity and he either went along or hung out at the house. WHAT? He told me that his whole family got together the Saturday before Christmas but the day was more reserved for the individual families of his siblings. So....his Christmas Days were kinda boring too. As the fall progressed I grew pretty fond this guy, he must have been fond of me too because he had already mentioned that he thought we should spend the rest of our lives together (the rest of that story is for another time). As we parted for Christmas break I asked him if he would visit me during the holidays. He said he would! He even said that he could come on Christmas Day if I wanted him to. Well, I jumped at that chance. When the day actually arrived I expected him to show after lunch sometime but my phone rang a little after 8 am! It was him and he was wanting directions from the gas station about 3 miles from my house!!! We had a great time. My parents liked him and by then my dad was actually hanging around and reading the paper on Christmas.
That was the first of many great memories for me. The next Christmas we were married and we had a little Charlie Brown tree! The one after that we were expecting Hannah! The one after that we were houseparents at the Alabama Baptist Children's Home. Then Micah came along, and after a few not too quiet holidays..the boys! Now, we have the "additional 4" to add tothe "original 4" and the two sweet sons-in-law and now baby Aidie! I can't wait for this year and all the craziness involved with meals and gifts and evenings with 14 people in the immediate family! It's pretty much a circus! Thank you God.
A Star was Born
(copied from facebook entry, Jan. 28th 2009)
I can't believe that twenty five years ago tonight I went bowling. I didn't actually bowl. I looked like I was smuggling a large bowling ball under my sweater but I just watched. Michael bowled with a bunch of friends from church. My feet were swollen along with my face. I was really hungry after that so we went to the local Steak place and I ate more than I should have probably, but it was wonderful.
Michael was working at a box company. He worked on Saturdays and had to go in really early. We had a piece of poster board on the kitchen table so at 5 something I wrote the first contraction. They were a few minutes apart. I called Michael at the plant. He came home and we were off to EAMC. He assured me it would be fine if we had a boy...a girl or a puppy. I was in no mood to laugh but of course I did.
I remember a crazy nurse, who kept saying she felt an ear?...I had visions of a baby with ears on the top of her head. There was a really bad epidural experience....bad enough that I had the next three without one. The moving from the "labor room" to the "delivery room" which in itself was frightening. The doctor and all the nurses were suited up like I was scheduled to have brain surgery. It was dark all around but bright light on the table where the "brain surgery"was to happen...I often felt like maybe they did actually remove my brain and forgot to tell me. Anyway, the next couple of hours were sketchy but bottom line I had a pink, warm, strangely sweet smelling little girl abruptly placed on my chest. She had the saddest little cry, like she had been in the middle of a really good dream and had rudely been shaken out of it.
I was totally in love! All the other people in the room faded to a faint Charlie Brown teacher voice....blahblahblahblahblahblah...I couldn't hear or see a thing but this little fairy who had settled on me. She was perfect! The most beautiful child ever born, well the virgin Mary may have had a prettier one but only her! I later found out that the doctor felt the need to pull my little punkin out with forcepts and she had a black eye and other marks and bruises and her daddy was in fact a little glad we'd taken all those child development classes that warned that newborns were not always the beauties parents expected! I knew the difference. I knew she was indeed the most exceptional baby in the world, textbooks knew nothing. Those writers had not seen MY baby.
I am finding it hard to fathom that "baby" now has her own little fairy princess. She has started the circle over yet again. It is a dance, a song, a story as old as our existance on this planet. I'm just imagining but I can hear God at the birth of the first baby girl "They think those boys are something....just wait til they meet her."
And so it all began, she was so sweet and cute and funny that we wanted to do it all over again two years later and again I was thrilled to have a baby girl. They have made my life so much more fun! People say...oh the weddings, the clothes, the hair products! No, there is nothing that has dampened my love for my girls. I adore my boys now, I hope everyone knows that as fact but I hope all my children have at least one girl.
Happy Birthday my precious baby princess! You are a blessing.
I can't believe that twenty five years ago tonight I went bowling. I didn't actually bowl. I looked like I was smuggling a large bowling ball under my sweater but I just watched. Michael bowled with a bunch of friends from church. My feet were swollen along with my face. I was really hungry after that so we went to the local Steak place and I ate more than I should have probably, but it was wonderful.
Michael was working at a box company. He worked on Saturdays and had to go in really early. We had a piece of poster board on the kitchen table so at 5 something I wrote the first contraction. They were a few minutes apart. I called Michael at the plant. He came home and we were off to EAMC. He assured me it would be fine if we had a boy...a girl or a puppy. I was in no mood to laugh but of course I did.
I remember a crazy nurse, who kept saying she felt an ear?...I had visions of a baby with ears on the top of her head. There was a really bad epidural experience....bad enough that I had the next three without one. The moving from the "labor room" to the "delivery room" which in itself was frightening. The doctor and all the nurses were suited up like I was scheduled to have brain surgery. It was dark all around but bright light on the table where the "brain surgery"was to happen...I often felt like maybe they did actually remove my brain and forgot to tell me. Anyway, the next couple of hours were sketchy but bottom line I had a pink, warm, strangely sweet smelling little girl abruptly placed on my chest. She had the saddest little cry, like she had been in the middle of a really good dream and had rudely been shaken out of it.
I was totally in love! All the other people in the room faded to a faint Charlie Brown teacher voice....blahblahblahblahb
I am finding it hard to fathom that "baby" now has her own little fairy princess. She has started the circle over yet again. It is a dance, a song, a story as old as our existance on this planet. I'm just imagining but I can hear God at the birth of the first baby girl "They think those boys are something....just wait til they meet her."
And so it all began, she was so sweet and cute and funny that we wanted to do it all over again two years later and again I was thrilled to have a baby girl. They have made my life so much more fun! People say...oh the weddings, the clothes, the hair products! No, there is nothing that has dampened my love for my girls. I adore my boys now, I hope everyone knows that as fact but I hope all my children have at least one girl.
Happy Birthday my precious baby princess! You are a blessing.
Pooky
(copied from facebook entry, Feb. 25th 2009)
Today we celebrate another birthday. My baby, Seth, a virtual giant of a person turns 15. I say giant because he is over 6'3" as I write this and he hasn't even slowed to a coast as far as growing goes. He's gonna be a big guy. He will have to be in order for his heart to fit him. From the first time I laid eyes on this little gem I knew he would be something special. For the first 2 years of his life he barely spoke anything we could understand. He had a knack for music though. At about 12 months he found a pencil and a paint can and begin to tap out a rhythm. I asked him what he was playing on his "drum". He hummed a little...I sang for him, "Jesus...loves me....this..I..know..." He smiled and continued. He was tapping out his first little song. Words came along in due time, I can't remember his first phrase but I've joked many times that it was "I'm the drummer". It may have actually been. When he finally did talk it was all jumbled up and "nuh nuh" was at the start of every request...to him I think it sounded like what everyone else was saying. "Nuh nuh cookie" meant that's what he wanted. We all got it. I didn't worry about him because once any Brown child started talking all bets were off. It was the music that continued to speak for Seth. At seven, he composed a beautiful piano piece that I thought sounded like leaves falling. He started taking piano lessons and would endure the painful practices "if" his sweet young teacher would listen to what he learned to play by ear that week. When we bought the piano, the salesman sat down and played something wonderful to give us a sample. Seth asked him to play it again....the sharp musician turned and said, "I know you young man...if I play this again you will 'know it' won't you, without music, you'd just watch and play". Seth sheepishly smiled and said, "yeah". The salesman knew he had a musical wonder looking at him. He also knew he had made the sale.
As he has grown Seth's interests have broadened some. He likes all kinds of instruments, guitar, banjo, anything with keys or requires sticks he can probably play. He has a vast interest in old music and is constantly trying to stump me in music trivia...sometimes he does.
Something I have enjoyed watching as much as his talent is his developing love for others. I see him as a defender of the weak and defenseless. He has shown more compassion and patience for Jonathan than anyone in our family. He has shared his room with this disturbed little guy and acts as his personal body guard at times. That's what I mean when I say his heart is so big. He is a fine person. A work in progress...a song almost ready to sing. It doesn't hurt either that when I've had a hard day my 6"3" baby hugs me and in the silliest little boy voice says, "I love you, mommy". Ah, he's still a gem.
Happy Birthday Seth Bennett!
Today we celebrate another birthday. My baby, Seth, a virtual giant of a person turns 15. I say giant because he is over 6'3" as I write this and he hasn't even slowed to a coast as far as growing goes. He's gonna be a big guy. He will have to be in order for his heart to fit him. From the first time I laid eyes on this little gem I knew he would be something special. For the first 2 years of his life he barely spoke anything we could understand. He had a knack for music though. At about 12 months he found a pencil and a paint can and begin to tap out a rhythm. I asked him what he was playing on his "drum". He hummed a little...I sang for him, "Jesus...loves me....this..I..know..." He smiled and continued. He was tapping out his first little song. Words came along in due time, I can't remember his first phrase but I've joked many times that it was "I'm the drummer". It may have actually been. When he finally did talk it was all jumbled up and "nuh nuh" was at the start of every request...to him I think it sounded like what everyone else was saying. "Nuh nuh cookie" meant that's what he wanted. We all got it. I didn't worry about him because once any Brown child started talking all bets were off. It was the music that continued to speak for Seth. At seven, he composed a beautiful piano piece that I thought sounded like leaves falling. He started taking piano lessons and would endure the painful practices "if" his sweet young teacher would listen to what he learned to play by ear that week. When we bought the piano, the salesman sat down and played something wonderful to give us a sample. Seth asked him to play it again....the sharp musician turned and said, "I know you young man...if I play this again you will 'know it' won't you, without music, you'd just watch and play". Seth sheepishly smiled and said, "yeah". The salesman knew he had a musical wonder looking at him. He also knew he had made the sale.
As he has grown Seth's interests have broadened some. He likes all kinds of instruments, guitar, banjo, anything with keys or requires sticks he can probably play. He has a vast interest in old music and is constantly trying to stump me in music trivia...sometimes he does.
Something I have enjoyed watching as much as his talent is his developing love for others. I see him as a defender of the weak and defenseless. He has shown more compassion and patience for Jonathan than anyone in our family. He has shared his room with this disturbed little guy and acts as his personal body guard at times. That's what I mean when I say his heart is so big. He is a fine person. A work in progress...a song almost ready to sing. It doesn't hurt either that when I've had a hard day my 6"3" baby hugs me and in the silliest little boy voice says, "I love you, mommy". Ah, he's still a gem.
Happy Birthday Seth Bennett!
My Cubby
(copied from a facebook entry Feb. 27th 2009)
So I have to give Blake credit for making Micah's name a really cute nickname. We always called her Micah B but when he came along it changed from Micah B...to My Cubby. Isn't that the cutest?!
Today we have another wonderful birth to celebrate. Twenty-three years ago on 2-27, at 2:27 the earth stood still for just a moment. Our second little girl made her grand appearance. The doctors had prodded and checked and stewed and consulted until I was just plain mad the day before. Seriously, I had seen 4 doctors in a period of an hour who all seemed to have differing opinions as to what to do with me. The dr who had delivered Hannah had told me not to let the next pregnancy go over my due date because Hannah had been plenty big and stayed in the birth canal a little too long. They ended up pulling her with forceps and were trying to get away from that. I tried to tell the drs and nobody wanted to listen. I finally got a grunt from dr Chase and a curt little "Not to worry, if this one's too big we'll "section you". If I hadn't been so fat and tired I would have tackled him and sectioned HIM! I told him I was not a cow! I would not be "sectioned" for his convenience! He carried on like I hadn't spoken. Anyway, another doctor looked, measured, poked, listened and said he agreed! Argh! Finally they called in dr Claybrook, who seemed the only one with some sense about him...He looked at my swollen nose and asked "Who's at the hospital tomorrow?!". The forth dr said he'd meet me at the hospital the following day and get this kid on her way. My first delivery was long and the epidural didn't work on both sides. I told them I thought I'd just wait this one out without the shot in the back. It only took 4 hours and some Demerol. Micah Blair Brown was the cutest thing I'd ever seen. She had the perfect little round head and was wide awake for her first pictures! She was fat and pink and just precious! We took her home to her big sister who was immediately in love with her.
At a few weeks she developed colic. It was rough! She cried from about 2 in the afternoon until she went to bed for the night, usually around 10. But she was a very good sleeper and at 10 days she slept from 10 to 6. I thought at that point I might just survive. We had some difficult weeks but she eventually grew past her tummy troubles and was a pretty pleasant baby. When she was two-ish she started becoming more mischievous. She was a tough customer when it came to crayons and walls, or anything she wanted and couldn't reach. We just chalked it up to being a Patterson descendant, headstrong and determined. She would argue with a stump and did! I loved listening to her talk....bossy! One time when Hannah was about 5 she was learning to ride her bike without training wheels. She had tried and tried but kept wrecking into the grass beside the driveway. She finally threw the thing down and said "I quit." Micah had been watching and went and hopped on the bike and rode it all the way next door to my parents house. She was a tenacious one!
When Micah was in kindergarten she was watching music videos one Sunday morning. A Michael W. Smith video was on and it had a rather graphic crucifixion scene. I walked through the room and saw her all curled up on the couch crying. I asked her what was wrong. At first she couldn't tell me but she pointed at the TV and said "Mommy, make it stop." I saw she was talking about the crucifixion. I told her that I couldn't make it stop. Jesus had really died like that but he didn't stay that way! He came back from the dead and we had a lot to be happy about because of him. It was only days later that she asked Jesus to "Live in" her heart. I realize she was only five or six but it was a real conversion. We call it the "parting of the clouds" for Micah. She had been lively and fun but after this she became all of that and more...she was agreeable and easy to enjoy. She was her true self.
Micah has such a heart for children. We've always called her the Baby Charmer because I've never seen one that didn't take to her like a moth to a flame. She just has a way about her that sets everyone at ease. I've been told by other moms that she is the most comfortable person in her own skin they've ever known and then they ask me how I did it. My answer is always the same. I didn't do anything. She's just that way because she's God's kid. She isn't proud or haughty, she's confident and independent and she can do anything God wills for her. I pray that for all my kids, that they will see themselves in relation to who God is. The more we make of him...the more he'll make of us.
I believe God put a vision in Micah's heart even before she was born. He knew he would create her to be a dreamer, a visionary. I had no idea how big that was going to be. I knew I had a real neat kid on my hands but I could only trust Him with what was to come. I am so glad she has chosen to trust him too. I can't wait to see what happens next!
Happy Birthday Micah B!
I love you!
So I have to give Blake credit for making Micah's name a really cute nickname. We always called her Micah B but when he came along it changed from Micah B...to My Cubby. Isn't that the cutest?!
Today we have another wonderful birth to celebrate. Twenty-three years ago on 2-27, at 2:27 the earth stood still for just a moment. Our second little girl made her grand appearance. The doctors had prodded and checked and stewed and consulted until I was just plain mad the day before. Seriously, I had seen 4 doctors in a period of an hour who all seemed to have differing opinions as to what to do with me. The dr who had delivered Hannah had told me not to let the next pregnancy go over my due date because Hannah had been plenty big and stayed in the birth canal a little too long. They ended up pulling her with forceps and were trying to get away from that. I tried to tell the drs and nobody wanted to listen. I finally got a grunt from dr Chase and a curt little "Not to worry, if this one's too big we'll "section you". If I hadn't been so fat and tired I would have tackled him and sectioned HIM! I told him I was not a cow! I would not be "sectioned" for his convenience! He carried on like I hadn't spoken. Anyway, another doctor looked, measured, poked, listened and said he agreed! Argh! Finally they called in dr Claybrook, who seemed the only one with some sense about him...He looked at my swollen nose and asked "Who's at the hospital tomorrow?!". The forth dr said he'd meet me at the hospital the following day and get this kid on her way. My first delivery was long and the epidural didn't work on both sides. I told them I thought I'd just wait this one out without the shot in the back. It only took 4 hours and some Demerol. Micah Blair Brown was the cutest thing I'd ever seen. She had the perfect little round head and was wide awake for her first pictures! She was fat and pink and just precious! We took her home to her big sister who was immediately in love with her.
At a few weeks she developed colic. It was rough! She cried from about 2 in the afternoon until she went to bed for the night, usually around 10. But she was a very good sleeper and at 10 days she slept from 10 to 6. I thought at that point I might just survive. We had some difficult weeks but she eventually grew past her tummy troubles and was a pretty pleasant baby. When she was two-ish she started becoming more mischievous. She was a tough customer when it came to crayons and walls, or anything she wanted and couldn't reach. We just chalked it up to being a Patterson descendant, headstrong and determined. She would argue with a stump and did! I loved listening to her talk....bossy! One time when Hannah was about 5 she was learning to ride her bike without training wheels. She had tried and tried but kept wrecking into the grass beside the driveway. She finally threw the thing down and said "I quit." Micah had been watching and went and hopped on the bike and rode it all the way next door to my parents house. She was a tenacious one!
When Micah was in kindergarten she was watching music videos one Sunday morning. A Michael W. Smith video was on and it had a rather graphic crucifixion scene. I walked through the room and saw her all curled up on the couch crying. I asked her what was wrong. At first she couldn't tell me but she pointed at the TV and said "Mommy, make it stop." I saw she was talking about the crucifixion. I told her that I couldn't make it stop. Jesus had really died like that but he didn't stay that way! He came back from the dead and we had a lot to be happy about because of him. It was only days later that she asked Jesus to "Live in" her heart. I realize she was only five or six but it was a real conversion. We call it the "parting of the clouds" for Micah. She had been lively and fun but after this she became all of that and more...she was agreeable and easy to enjoy. She was her true self.
Micah has such a heart for children. We've always called her the Baby Charmer because I've never seen one that didn't take to her like a moth to a flame. She just has a way about her that sets everyone at ease. I've been told by other moms that she is the most comfortable person in her own skin they've ever known and then they ask me how I did it. My answer is always the same. I didn't do anything. She's just that way because she's God's kid. She isn't proud or haughty, she's confident and independent and she can do anything God wills for her. I pray that for all my kids, that they will see themselves in relation to who God is. The more we make of him...the more he'll make of us.
I believe God put a vision in Micah's heart even before she was born. He knew he would create her to be a dreamer, a visionary. I had no idea how big that was going to be. I knew I had a real neat kid on my hands but I could only trust Him with what was to come. I am so glad she has chosen to trust him too. I can't wait to see what happens next!
Happy Birthday Micah B!
I love you!
Micah helping baby Aiden learn to crawl.
Always the life of the party!
Matthan
(copied from facebook entry April 17th 2009)
I have started a sort of tradition with my notes on my kids' birthdays and it is with great pleasure that I continue it on the eve of two more!
Seventeen glorious years ago Matthan was born. To back up just a few months I have to say I asked God for him...yep, that's right I just came right out and asked the Lord for a son. When the next month I started wanting to throw up in my cornflakes I smiled and said, "Wow, that was quick!".
God never ceases to amaze me.
I had been teaching P.E. at Trinity Christian School and had the kids dragging chairs out for me to sit on and dragging them back at the end of the day...they were all excited too. My "big girls" couldn't wait to have a baby brother and I never thought for a second he'd be anything but a bouncing baby boy. On April 17 I went to the hospital to be induced. The doctor felt we needed to go ahead due to a little blood pressure issue I was having so a few days early George Matthan Brown arrived. He got here so quick that his daddy almost missed it, fact be told, he was at Tyler's eating chicken fingers because he thought (and had probably been told) to go on and get some dinner. So Matthan's first experience with his dad was him singing into his little ear with chicken finger breath.
From the very beginning Matthan was THE PRINCE at our house. He was the funniest, cutiest, smartest, most curious little guy ever! We all were in love!Just a wonder! My dad called him "Buddy", it never stuck with any of the rest of us because Matty or Matman or Lovie or my favorite "Bubby" were always more appropriate. He was all boy and a JOY. He had such an extensive vocabulary! He used words like "actually" and "probably" in the right context before he was two. When most kids would say "I wanna cookie" Matthan would say "Mom, I tink I wanna Oweeo....no, actually I wanna choc-it chip...it's pwaabwabwe in da cabnit". When Seth was born, Matthan was 22 months old. I asked him where our baby Seth came from (thinking he would say "Heaven" or "fwom God", typical Sunday School answers right?) Matthan thought for a minute and replied...."Hum, pwabwabwe Walmart". I nearly fell over laughing. What a kid!!!
He has continued to shock, amaze and entertain our family his entire life. It has really been fun watching him grow up. I can't believe it's been seventeen years. His talent is from God. He does not get that voice from me or his dad. We have just stood speechless at his acting ability, his creative bend, his presence on a stage. I know he is my kid but I think it is apparent to others that he was born to be center stage! He has certainly been that in our family life. He holds the mood of our family in his hand...it's a gift and I guess at times can be a curse to him...I had a teacher tell me once when he was in grade school that if Matthan was happy when he entered the room the whole class seemed to catch it but if something was troubling him...everyone took it on like a cloud covering them all. What charisma! But I understood it. I'd seen him in action.
He has what my friend LeAnn calls an anointing.
I used to tell him the story about David in the Bible. I was mostly afraid he would let his size bother him. By the time Seth was two he was taller than Matthan. I know of one summer when they stood eye to eye but Seth soon passed him again. I told him about when Samuel came to Jesse's house to anoint the new king, he had gone through all the other boys, seven of them, nope, no king so Samuel asked Jesse, "Are you sure this is it?" and Jesse mumbled something about the runt out tending the sheep. Samuel sent for him and in walks a little boy. God had Samuel anoint him then and there as the new king...he was small but he had a big future. I have always felt that Matthan had big work to do. Maybe he has found a clue as to what his life will involve. I can only trust God with him.
I did ask God for him in the first place....
He has been such fun!
He and his brother have made me almost wreck for laughing so hard I couldn't see.
He has surprised me with so many wonderful little things...rocks, lizards, frogs and assorted treats in pockets.
He has grown into a young man with good ideas and fascinating friends
He is a person I truly love to be around.(Hannah paid him the highest sister compliment several years ago when she said she'd take him anywhere, anytime because he was just that good of a companion.)
He has become a hero to three little girls who think he can do just about anything imaginable just because he is.
He may not be a future king, but I am confident that this young man will take on the world in some way and change it for the better!
Happy Birthday little prince... you'll always be a wonder to me!
I have started a sort of tradition with my notes on my kids' birthdays and it is with great pleasure that I continue it on the eve of two more!
Seventeen glorious years ago Matthan was born. To back up just a few months I have to say I asked God for him...yep, that's right I just came right out and asked the Lord for a son. When the next month I started wanting to throw up in my cornflakes I smiled and said, "Wow, that was quick!".
God never ceases to amaze me.
I had been teaching P.E. at Trinity Christian School and had the kids dragging chairs out for me to sit on and dragging them back at the end of the day...they were all excited too. My "big girls" couldn't wait to have a baby brother and I never thought for a second he'd be anything but a bouncing baby boy. On April 17 I went to the hospital to be induced. The doctor felt we needed to go ahead due to a little blood pressure issue I was having so a few days early George Matthan Brown arrived. He got here so quick that his daddy almost missed it, fact be told, he was at Tyler's eating chicken fingers because he thought (and had probably been told) to go on and get some dinner. So Matthan's first experience with his dad was him singing into his little ear with chicken finger breath.
From the very beginning Matthan was THE PRINCE at our house. He was the funniest, cutiest, smartest, most curious little guy ever! We all were in love!Just a wonder! My dad called him "Buddy", it never stuck with any of the rest of us because Matty or Matman or Lovie or my favorite "Bubby" were always more appropriate. He was all boy and a JOY. He had such an extensive vocabulary! He used words like "actually" and "probably" in the right context before he was two. When most kids would say "I wanna cookie" Matthan would say "Mom, I tink I wanna Oweeo....no, actually I wanna choc-it chip...it's pwaabwabwe in da cabnit". When Seth was born, Matthan was 22 months old. I asked him where our baby Seth came from (thinking he would say "Heaven" or "fwom God", typical Sunday School answers right?) Matthan thought for a minute and replied...."Hum, pwabwabwe Walmart". I nearly fell over laughing. What a kid!!!
He has continued to shock, amaze and entertain our family his entire life. It has really been fun watching him grow up. I can't believe it's been seventeen years. His talent is from God. He does not get that voice from me or his dad. We have just stood speechless at his acting ability, his creative bend, his presence on a stage. I know he is my kid but I think it is apparent to others that he was born to be center stage! He has certainly been that in our family life. He holds the mood of our family in his hand...it's a gift and I guess at times can be a curse to him...I had a teacher tell me once when he was in grade school that if Matthan was happy when he entered the room the whole class seemed to catch it but if something was troubling him...everyone took it on like a cloud covering them all. What charisma! But I understood it. I'd seen him in action.
He has what my friend LeAnn calls an anointing.
I used to tell him the story about David in the Bible. I was mostly afraid he would let his size bother him. By the time Seth was two he was taller than Matthan. I know of one summer when they stood eye to eye but Seth soon passed him again. I told him about when Samuel came to Jesse's house to anoint the new king, he had gone through all the other boys, seven of them, nope, no king so Samuel asked Jesse, "Are you sure this is it?" and Jesse mumbled something about the runt out tending the sheep. Samuel sent for him and in walks a little boy. God had Samuel anoint him then and there as the new king...he was small but he had a big future. I have always felt that Matthan had big work to do. Maybe he has found a clue as to what his life will involve. I can only trust God with him.
I did ask God for him in the first place....
He has been such fun!
He and his brother have made me almost wreck for laughing so hard I couldn't see.
He has surprised me with so many wonderful little things...rocks, lizards, frogs and assorted treats in pockets.
He has grown into a young man with good ideas and fascinating friends
He is a person I truly love to be around.(Hannah paid him the highest sister compliment several years ago when she said she'd take him anywhere, anytime because he was just that good of a companion.)
He has become a hero to three little girls who think he can do just about anything imaginable just because he is.
He may not be a future king, but I am confident that this young man will take on the world in some way and change it for the better!
Happy Birthday little prince... you'll always be a wonder to me!
Felicity Means Happiness
(copied from Facebook entry April 17th 2009)
Today is also Felicity's birthday! Although I was not there when she was born, I'm sure it was a special day. We got her in January of her second year so this is her third birthday as a part of our family.
I am told that Felicity means "happiness". When she first came into our lives, even though she had an excellent first foster family she was not a very happy baby. She was traumatized. That's all I need to say about her history. She was a victim, there were many. It took her a while to warm up to us entirely, the first few nights were sleepless but once we discovered she had infections in both ears she got better, much better. We bonded as a family those first few nights, even Matthan and Seth took turns patting her back while sitting by her crib....as long as there was patting she would lie there still but once it stopped the wailing began. Funny how the warm human touch is like medicine sometimes. After we got that horrible week out of the way things were better for "Lissy". In the beginning she could say 25-30 words, she was solemn and quiet. She was as bowlegged as an cowboy I'd ever seen even in cartoons. I don't remember when they said she had actually started walking but it had not been long, she was not real sure of herself on her feet and I was horrified she would fall down the stairs. She never did, I suppose there were always plenty of hands to stop her in this house (both human and angelic). She took to following her sisters everywhere and has not stopped. I laugh about the flicker or concern I may have had for her not talking...now she seldom stops! She is still a bit on the small size, which just endears her all the more to everyone. She's like a little sprite, a fairy of a thing, busy and noisy and funny and loving all rolled up in a beautiful child. I don't believe she is going to have any long term effects from her first few months without all she needed, that in itself is a miracle. She has what she needs now! The endless love of our Father in heaven and the bottomless bucket of family love that comes from our three ring circus, of which she is certainly a STAR!
I believe of all the things her birth mother was not able to give her she did give her a special gift...her name, it fits her.
Today is also Felicity's birthday! Although I was not there when she was born, I'm sure it was a special day. We got her in January of her second year so this is her third birthday as a part of our family.
I am told that Felicity means "happiness". When she first came into our lives, even though she had an excellent first foster family she was not a very happy baby. She was traumatized. That's all I need to say about her history. She was a victim, there were many. It took her a while to warm up to us entirely, the first few nights were sleepless but once we discovered she had infections in both ears she got better, much better. We bonded as a family those first few nights, even Matthan and Seth took turns patting her back while sitting by her crib....as long as there was patting she would lie there still but once it stopped the wailing began. Funny how the warm human touch is like medicine sometimes. After we got that horrible week out of the way things were better for "Lissy". In the beginning she could say 25-30 words, she was solemn and quiet. She was as bowlegged as an cowboy I'd ever seen even in cartoons. I don't remember when they said she had actually started walking but it had not been long, she was not real sure of herself on her feet and I was horrified she would fall down the stairs. She never did, I suppose there were always plenty of hands to stop her in this house (both human and angelic). She took to following her sisters everywhere and has not stopped. I laugh about the flicker or concern I may have had for her not talking...now she seldom stops! She is still a bit on the small size, which just endears her all the more to everyone. She's like a little sprite, a fairy of a thing, busy and noisy and funny and loving all rolled up in a beautiful child. I don't believe she is going to have any long term effects from her first few months without all she needed, that in itself is a miracle. She has what she needs now! The endless love of our Father in heaven and the bottomless bucket of family love that comes from our three ring circus, of which she is certainly a STAR!
I believe of all the things her birth mother was not able to give her she did give her a special gift...her name, it fits her.
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